Chapter 8

Irv got to talking with Kathy. "How long have you two been married?"

Kathy held up three fingers.

Irv dug deeper. "Ever any footsie?"

When Kathy didn't answer immediately, Dale moved over and prodded, "Answer the man's question, Kathy."

Irv broadened the area of discussion. "I'm asking both of you. What about it, Dale?"

Dale blustered it through, "I may be married, but I'm not dead."

Kathy for the first time in the hour was reached by the comment. She was shocked and hurt. What a terrible thing to say. Kathy thought it was worse for him to say it than to do it.

Dale knew he shouldn't have said it right after he spoke. He tried to speak kindly, "What about you, honey? Since we've been married, I mean?"

Kathy wanted to say she had been laid by a hundred men but she couldn't get her tongue to say it. Instead she said, "That's a secret. Maybe someday you'll know the secret."

Liz smiled, "That's right, my dear, don't ever reveal anything. Keep them guessing. Don't tell."

Dale said to Liz, "She'll answer me. She tells me everything. Don't you Kathy?"

Suddenly Kathy was furious. "You can go to hell," she shouted.

She spoke so loud, Mitch got alarmed. He said, "What kind of a party is this anyway? We need joviality, not quarreling. Now come, kids, we're all love children."

Irv stood between Kathy and Dale. He was relentless. "Kathy, I mean it. How many times have guys made a pass at you at a party? And how many times have you said yes? And Dale, what about you? How many times have you sneaked into another room at a party and made it with another girl?"

Dale answered first, "I don't know." He looked at Kathy to get an inkling of what she might say. She was stone-faced.

Irv touched her shoulder. "How many times?"

"I've lost count," Kathy said stubbornly.

Dale was surprised. He believed. "You never said anything."

Kathy had the floor now. Everyone was looking at her. "How could I," she lied. "Half the time it was some big-wig-the company-one of your bosses. I didn't know then how I could capitalize on it. Sorry I let you down. Dale."

Mitch could sense everything wasn't okay. He waxed philosophical to take the heat off the young couple. "With everyone sex makes the world go 'round. All this jazz about Hollywood orgies! You think it's any different in East Overcoat, Iowa? Or anywhere else? In a pig's eye! Everybody balls. Everybody."

Irv couldn't pass that up. "If Mitch says so then you can bet it's a Communist conspiracy. Sex was designed just to get married couples in trouble to foment trouble and revolution."

Mitch was practical this time. "Even though it does cause a revolution, it's still ass. A very important commodity."

Liz, who had been out of the room for a few moments, came back in wearing a sheer peignoir. She had a magnificent figure and always got whistles from the men. She did this time, too. Mitch said proudly, "That's my wife! Look at them boobs, and they're hard as rocks. Solid. Come on, kid, just touch them," he said to Dale. Dale touched them gingerly from the outside. "Firm," he said.

"Thank you," said Liz, "though I don't know how you could tell touching them like that."

Dale went back for a second grab. "Wonderful," he said. "Like rocks." He looked Kathy's way but she paid no attention to him.

Mitch addressed a speech to Dale. "Kathy's a terrific looking kid. Men are going to try and get her into the sack any way they can-just the way you'll try to score with someone else's wife. So you might as well get used to it. If you can erase jealousy from a marriage, you got it beat. Remember that."

"The thoughts of Chairman Mitch," Natalie said. "He can reduce Einstein's Theory of Relativity to one line. Everything is simple to him, even marriage."

"Mitch's right," Irv said. "Fidelity has broken up more marriages than poverty. It's too hard to live with."

Kathy and Dale exchanged glances.

Irv preached, "Live like the Europeans. They know two people can love each other and still find others attractive and they're not afraid to admit it. I like that."

Kathy frowned. She thought to herself, "Okay, I'm a swinger but I got to have my say." She said out loud, "If you really love someone-well, why would you want anyone else? I mean according to what you say we're not anything better than animals. Can that be?"

Irv took the ball. "If people could adjust to life as well as animals, this would be a lot better world to live in. Man is the only inhumane creature on earth."

Mitch didn't like anyone else being intellectual. He growled at Irv, "Give you an inch and you never shut up."

That didn't stop Irv. "What breaks up most marriages? Sexual boredom. One partner gets the itch and starts looking around. Next an affair, a romance, the adulterer's excuse for the basic urge. Swingers don't have that problem. If a gal wants to play she doesn't have to sneak off with the boy at the local supermarket to do it."

Natalie laughed and laughed. It probably hit home in some way because she giggled, "You should see the box boy."

Liz laughed at that too.

Kathy mused, almost as if talking to herself, "I've never thought of it like that."

Irv faced Kathy directly to make the point, "How many of your friends have been divorced?"

Kathy thought a moment and it came through like a revelation, "Seems like most of them."

"You see," Irv pronounced happily, "we've been swinging for five years and don't know one swinging couple who have split up. Right, Liz?"

Liz nodded.

Natalie wrapped it up with, "The family that plays together, stays together."

Irv explained further to Kathy, "You see, there are no emotional involvements, no jealousy."

"You left out the most important part," Mitch added. "You can trust a swinger. It's been proven over and over again. I've never been shafted by one yet. It's the squares who give you the shaft and every time."

Irv put his arm around Mitch's shoulder. "One of these days we ought to make a list Mitch. Cross index swingers by occupation. When you need a plumber, call a swinging plumber, a dentist ... a swinging dentist."

Dale had been looking for a chance to bring up the real reason he was present, "Don't forget, please, the swinging insurance man."

Kathy smiled. She remembered everything now and she felt everything was going swimmingly.

Liz had a comment too, "You know if you looked at our country club roster we'd find half are swingers. Even if most of them wouldn't admit it."

Natalie smiled knowingly, "Would you believe 99% of them?"

"She's right," Irving said. "You know if swinging catches on further, we could start a franchise operation-the Swingers of Kansas, the Swingers of Tennessee, etc."

Mitch was more serious about it. "No, I mean it. I'd rather do business anytime with a swinger. Wouldn't you, Irv?"

"You said it! And you can't beat the fringe benefits."

Kathy, the more conventional, practical one, introduced a new thought, "What happens if ... well, what happens if someone gets pregnant?"

Natalie had an answer as she had the answer for everything. "Kathy, dear, you have to remember the swinger motto, honey, don't be half safe, be cocksure. Take the pill."

The laugh was drowned out by the telephone. Liz answered the phone. "Oh, hi, Thelma ... good, make it quick, will you, hon. No nothing's started yet. We've been waiting for you two. By...." She hung up the phone. "They're on their way."

"Great," Irv said. "Now there are two swingers what am.

Kathy got up when Dale and Natalie began dancing again. She meandered outside to the pool, lit up in a green flare of light from its bottom. Music from the inside stereo could be heard over an outside speaker.

Mitch watched her go and then wandered outside after her.

Mitch could see that from Kathy's position at the pool she could see Dale minus tie, shirt open, lying on the sectional, head in Natalie's lap and her hand inside his shirt, making massage motions.

Mitch could see that Kathy was thoughtful. She looked at her reflection in the pool. Mitch thought back to the many nude swimming parties held at this pool and all the beautiful girls he had seen in it. Yet none as attractive as Kathy and none he wanted to see in the nude more than Kathy.

As he approached her, she was startled. She gave a little gasp.

"Why don't you go in?" Mitch asked. "You don't need a suit. In fact suits are barred around here. Right now, no one could see, only me. And that's the plot."

Kathy replied hesitantly, "No. I don't think so."

There was silence for a bit. Mitch reached out to touch her hair and said huskily, "You are very beautiful, the beauty given an added dimension by your shyness."

Kathy argued the point. "I'm not shy. Just quiet." She wanted to fit into all this for Dale's sake. She didn't want them to think she was shy.

"Don't be afraid of me," Mitch asked. "I like you. I would never do anything you didn't want me to do."

Kathy smiled. "I know. A woman senses those things. What worries me is that I must seem like an awful square to you."

"Because of your not wanting to swim bare-assed? No. You're sweet. I couldn't criticize you for anything you did. You should have seen Liz the first time. She had the idea we just walked in and ripped off our clothes and then we went wild."

Kathy said quietly. "Yes, I remember swimming naked myself with Dale and how excited and good I felt."

They walked slowly about the pool, hand in hand. Mitch thought, "I wonder how my life would have been changed had I married a girl like Kathy. I love Liz and she's fun but she's outgoing, uninhibited like me. I wonder if a more conventional girl like Kathy would have taken the rough edges off me."

"I know you think we're a strange lot," Mitch said. He felt they all needed some further explanation. "We're just sophisticated people. We talk, drink and think like everyone else. We're not freaks at all."

Kathy could feel a rapport building up toward Mitch. She had to ask him. "When it's over ... well, aren't there regrets? I understand the thrills. When you come out of it ... I mean after all it's your wife or husband and it's been drummed into you all these years. What about Liz? How does she feel? How can you let another man...? You know, I can't believe this is happening."

"I understand your doubts," Mitch said. "I do. But it happens and I'm glad it does. Liz feels the same way. I love Liz. She loves me. With that extra freedom we love each other all the more. There are no locks on us. We appreciate the freedom each gives the other. It brings us closer together and not further apart."

They walked until they reached the diving board. They leaned against it.

Kathy wasn't convinced. "But how do you know Liz feels that way? What if she does all that to please you? I know women and they don't always tell the truth-the facts."

Mitch could only chuckle at that. "You don't know Liz. She's a lot of woman. And we are always truthful with each other."

"That's what I don't understand. You love Liz. Well, isn't that enough for you? Why do you need other women?"

Mitch had to search for answers. "Well, let me ask you, why are you here tonight?"

Kathy didn't exactly know why. She felt she was doing it for Dale. But to be honest she had to admit to herself that she was curious too. She said to Mitch, "I'm not really sure." At least that was honest.

Mitch asked, "Do you love Dale?" He wasn't exactly sure why but he hoped she'd say no.

But she only h-edged a little. "I hope I do. I have always believed I did. Yes, I think so."

Mitch couldn't understand that. "I always thought all women knew all about love by instinct." He had to ask the other question. "Does Dale love you?" Again he hoped there'd be doubt in her answer.

But Kathy seemed to have no doubt about this one. "Yes, he does."

"Well," Mitch answered philosophically, "then that's all that matters. Certainly anything that happens here tonight will have nothing to do with tomorrow. It won't change anything."

Muted door chimes came from the house.

Mitch said, "Mike and Thelma. You'll get a kick out of them and more important the action now starts. Right now."